Like other teachers, I have been teaching my students remotely using “distance learning” since we started staying home due to COVID-19. My school district had issued Chromebooks to all students, and I have been using Google Classroom as the main platform to present lessons and collect assignments, so the switch to distance learning was fairly smooth in terms of the technology. When we first stayed home, I looked at the situation as a short-term annoyance. I missed seeing my students in person, so I just tried to make the best of it and get through it. However, now that I am in my eighth week doing it, I have realized that this distance learning experience has had a couple of positive outcomes for my teaching practice.

One realization is that distance learning has made me much more focused on my lesson planning – and I was a careful planner before this – so that now I am taking a lot of time to review each lesson in my mind and think through issues or questions the students might have. Because all of my lessons are set up so that the students work independently – none of them are presented “live” – the students need to be able to open them and understand them on their own. They can contact me with questions, but I have observed that most students will just try to do it on their own. When I was teaching in a normal classroom, I planned out what I believed would be a good lesson, but I often left the details to be worked out as I presented the lesson in class. If questions came up, I knew I would be there to answer them. Not now – I need to anticipate those questions and answer them within the lesson. What I have realized from this experience is that if I follow the same approach that I am using now when we eventually return to school, then my lessons in a normal classroom will be much clearer and avoid the confusion that sometimes came up in the past as I presented a difficult concept. I will still encourage inquiry and questioning, but I will be better at avoiding confusion and misconceptions.

The other big realization I had is related to what I just wrote. In our school district, we have been striving to do more and more student-centered learning, and that is exactly what we are doing now during distance learning. Therefore, when we return to school, I plan to use the same lessons as I am using now – pre-recorded videos and all – especially where I used to use a lecture format. Students will be able to open the lesson and do it at their own pace. They will not struggle to keep up in a lecture or activity that I am running. This change will free me from teaching from the front of the classroom and allow me to walk around and conference with students and help those who need it. With a little extra work, I can make lessons with options so that students will be able to do work tailored for them. The only time I will keep the class focused on one task and working together is for some group projects and labs, but even then, I think letting the students work on their own to understand the directions is better than having them listen to me given an introductory lecture.

I believe this type of reflection is very important, because it would be easy when this unusual situation is over to forget it ever happened and to go back to “normal.” But normal was not always optimum, so we have a chance to make it better if we take time to capture and discuss lessons learned like this. I hope other teachers have similar positive experiences from distance learning to share.